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Gold and Power in Ancient Costa Rica,Panama, and Colombia

Jeffrey Quilter and John W. Hoopes, Editors

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Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and CollectionWashington, D.C.

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Goldwork and Chibchan Identity:

Endogenous Change and Diffuse Unity

in the Isthmo-Colombian Area

John W. HoopesUniversity of Kansas

Oscar M. Fonseca Z.University of Costa Rica

Introduction

An 1892 portrait of Antonio Saldaña, the last hereditary chief of the Bribri, shows himwearing a necklace of ancient bird pendants with surfaces of pure gold (see thefrontispiece). His status and power permitted him to wear these ornaments, which

as ancient talismans also conferred power upon him. Saldaña’s use of these ornaments in-voked Pre-Columbian authority, which was in turn derived from heredity and identity. It islikely that Saldaña believed the power of these aguilas would protect him from the aggres-sions of Western development in the ancestral territory of his people. The power of gold inindigenous societies of Central and South America was inextricably linked to its ability todraw upon the power of ancient identity for expressions of power in the world of thepresent. This attribute of gold derived from its specific place in what Eric Wolf terms the“structure of power,” in which identity, mythology, and material culture are used to createideology, “a complex of ideas selected to underwrite and represent a particular project ofinstalling, maintaining, and aggrandizing power in social relationships” (Wolf 1999: 55).

Social identity is frequently described by reference to kinship, particularly ancestry.Wolf ’s examples of the Aztecs, Kwakiutl, and Nazis, as well as of the royal families of England,the Ivory Coast, and Thailand demonstrate how power can be derived from an ability totrace ancestry far back in time, including mythological time; genealogical relationships tosources of power are used to justify noble identity. For the Late Classic Maya, much powerand authority derived from the ability of an ahau (lord) to document his lineage, tracing it tothe origins of the then-present world and linking it to the identities of specific celestialbodies. The same was true of the Inka emperors, who traced their ancestry to the mythicalhero Manco Capac, in turn descended from the sun (Urton 1990). Gold iconography insouthern Central America and northern South America is replete with references to origins,ancestors, and relationships of kinship between powerful actors and elements of the naturalworld. As such, it communicates information about the identities of the individuals whoused it. These identities played a critical role in the structure of power.

50 John W. Hoopes and Oscar M. Fonseca Z.

A useful step toward comprehending relationships between gold and power in Pre-Columbian societies is to reconstruct the “identity” of peoples within the historical andgeographic spaces in which these relations were manifest. Identity derives from heredity,language, territory, and histories of common experiences. The widespread use of specif icstyles of gold and tumbaga objects in Costa Rica, Panama, and Colombia suggests the exist-ence of a certain level of identity that was common to the region as a whole. Multiple linesof evidence from linguistics, genetics, ethnohistory, and archaeology indicate signif icant con-tinuities in language, population, worldview, and material culture within a portion of theIntermediate Area, offering a rich context for the interpretation of ancient identity. Suchcontext illuminates the origins and the sixteenth-century conf iguration of people who dis-tinguished themselves by the use of gold and tumbaga ornaments at the time of the Spanishconquest. Reconstitution of an indigenous identity also has the potential of empoweringliving indigenous peoples whose heritage is often interpreted as comparing unfavorablywith that of Mesoamerican and Andean peoples.

The central portion of the Intermediate Area was not inhabited by an unrelated collec-tion of independent tribes and chiefdoms, but by people who shared a common genetic,linguistic, and cultural heritage stretching back several millennia. The concept of an Isthmo-Colombian Area1 is especially useful for the reconstruction of ancient identities that mayhave contributed to the constitution of power in ancient Costa Rica, Panama, and Colom-bia. This operative concept draws upon multiple lines of evidence from linguistics, genetics,ethnohistory, ethnography, archaeology, and art history. In a fashion similar to the way Mayanlanguages have helped def ine a research area, the distribution of Chibchan languages inparticular can be used to outline a historical space whose “diffuse unity” provides a viablecontext for the interpretation of ancient goldwork, social organization, and cosmology inthe region.

Linguistic patterns gleaned from ethnohistoric sources and modern f ield research pro-vide an important point of departure for the investigation of historical processes in Pre-Columbian times. When these are combined with modern genetics and archaeological data,an interdisciplinary model emerges for in situ culture change associated with specif ic popu-lations that challenge the concept of this region as one that was peripheral (and character-ized by migration rather than relative population stability) with the notion that it was a center,characterized by endogenous change in populations of common ancestry who shared ele-ments of cosmology, worldview, and distinctive forms of social organization that may informus about the relationships among gold, power, and ideology.

The def inition of an Isthmo-Colombian Area is far from problematic. Just as Mixe-Zoquean speakers framed Mayan speakers, or as the Quechua world of the southern Andesdrew upon the experience of Aymara neighbors, the Isthmo-Colombian Area shared a com-plex dynamic that included internal linguistic frontiers between Chibchan and Chocoan speakersas well as external frontiers with Carib, Paézan-Barbacoan, and Amazonian neighbors.

1 The “Isthmo-Colombian Area” does not include all of Colombia, which is also comprised of areas thatmay be included in the Caribbean, Amazonian, and Andean areas. The Caribbean area, for example, wouldinclude populations of the islands and littoral regions who did not speak Chibchan languages but those in theCarib and Arawakan families.

51 Goldwork and Chibchan Identity

Gordon Willey (1971: 278) notes, however, that for the Intermediate Area “there are nohorizon styles comparable in scope to those of the Peruvian area. The closest approach tosuch horizontal phenomena is seen in the goldwork of Colombia and Lower Central America.”The use and symbolism of gold and tumbaga in combination with recent interpretations oflinguistic and genetic evidence appear to highlight the existence of an “Isthmo-Colombian”culture area that supplants older notions. Gold artifacts have the potential to reveal commonideas whose age often predates its expression in metallurgy. Gold jewelry also existed withinsocial and conceptual contexts in which language, kinship, and ecology conditioned the useof symbols by individuals who sought to affect relationships and behavior among others.

Definition of the Isthmo-Colombian Area

There is an increasing dissatisfaction with the connotations of the terms IntermediateArea (Haberland 1957; Lange 1992a; Rouse 1962; Willey 1971; Willey 1959) and LowerCentral America (Baudez 1963; Lange and Stone 1984; Lothrop 1966; Willey 1971). TheIntermediate Area includes an enormous diversity of cultural groups between western Hon-duras and northern Peru. It was initially conceived as an area distinguished by participationin general patterns of Nuclear America, but lacking unifying, Formative “great styles,” suchas those of the Olmec or Chavín (Willey 1959). Despite Willey’s noteworthy efforts at def in-ing an “Intermediate Area Cultural Tradition” (Willey 1971: 277–278), the great diversity ofcharacteristics he describes did not include observations about ideology or worldview. Fur-thermore, the name Intermediate Area has taken on negative connotations and def inition bywhat is not known rather than what is known of it (Sheets 1992). The term also carriesimplicit diffusionist and evolutionist connotations, given its position between Mesoamericaand the Andean area as a raison d’etre—the explanation that eventually def ines it.

Lower Central America was initially used for the region south and east of Mesoamerica,excluding South America on geographical grounds (Baudez 1963). It has its historical rootsin ethnocentric formulations such as Kirchhoff ’s (1943: 93) divisions of “superior cultiva-tors” and “inferior cultivators.” The Chibchan language family, f irst identif ied by Max Uhle(1890) is the largest in this general region, and may prove to be the oldest. It inspired Kirchhoffto attempt to identify a “Chibcha” culture area in the same paper in which he presented hisclassic def inition of Mesoamerica (Kirchhoff 1943). His notion of a culture area based uponChibchan-speaking populations, however, was largely disregarded by area scholars, who con-tinued to def ine the region not as a center but as a periphery, “lower” in a cultural evolution-ary sense and “intermediate” in a geographical sense relative to the areas of “high” culturesand state societies to the north and south (Sheets 1992).

General syntheses of Lower Central America failed to account for specif ic culturalcontinuities with Colombia until Warwick Bray’s “Across the Darien Gap”(1984). The ideaof def ining an area based upon Chibchan populations that included portions of northernColombia received renewed attention when his essay was translated into Spanish (Bray 1990).Upon undertaking a synthetic work on the archaeology of Costa Rica, Oscar Fonseca Z.(1992) considered it necessary, in order to organize the data known up to that moment, to


propose an alternative culture area: the Chibcha Historical Region. The nomenclature hasbeen successively revised thus: from Región Histórica Chibcha (1992; Fonseca and Cooke1993) to Región Histórica Chibcha-Chocó (Cooke 1993) to Área de Tradición Chibchoide(Fonseca 1994) and Área Histórica Chibchoide (Fonseca 1997; 1998).2 Although Chibchanpopulations—def ined on the basis of linguistic and genetic evidence—were central to thearea’s character, there are problems with terminology linked to specif ic linguistic or ethnicterms. For example, Chibcha is an alternative name for the Muisca of highland Colombia, agroup not at all typical of Chibchan-speaking populations as a whole.3 The “Isthmo-Colom-bian” designation acknowledges the strong relationships between Central America and north-ern South America while avoiding conf licts inherent in the use of terms with specif ic culturalmeanings, such as Chibchan or Chibchan-Chocoan. Isthmo-Columbia is intended, however, toemphasize the critical importance of portions of northern Colombia,4 discussion of which isincluded in the seminal Archaeology of Lower Central America (Lange and Stone 1984), yetsignif icantly underrepresented, along with Ecuador and Venezuela, in the more recent Wealthand Hierarchy in the Intermediate Area (Lange, ed. 1992). The Isthmo-Colombian designation isintentionally more restrictive than the broader Intermediate Area concept, which despitesignif icant improvements remains limited in its interpretive value (Sheets 1992).5

Willey drew a distinction between cultures of the Intermediate Area and those to thenorth and south, suggesting that cultures of “Middle America”6 were “participating not onlyin common technical traditions but in an ideational heritage” from Late Formative times onand that Formative populations of Mesoamerica and the Andean region were “sharing in awidespread idea system and transmitting at least a part of this system to later generations andcultures” (Willey 1959). While there may not have been a unifying great style for the Isthmo-Colombian Area, a growing body of evidence supports the notion that shared worldviewswere one feature of a “diffuse unity” that conditioned the structuring of power amongChibchan-speaking peoples from the f irst centuries B.C. until the sixteenth century. Althoughthe specif ic ideologies have been lost, elements of them remain in the iconography of goldand tumbaga ornaments. Some of these continue to play a role in indigenous identity in theregion today.

The identif ication of culture areas as research zones has a long history in archaeology(Wissler 1938). Despite strong critiques (Creamer 1987; Lyman, O’Brien, and Dunnell1997), they continue to structure syntheses of knowledge found in textbooks and mu-seum exhibitions, affecting the self-identif ication of research professionals and the com-

2 We had suggested the term Chibcha Nuclear Area in 1999, but this was set aside after subsequent commen-tary and discussion.

3 Kirchhoff (1943) specif ically excludes the Muisca from his “Chibcha” taxon for having “Andean culturalaff inities.”

4 The term Isthmo-Colombian does not include all of the modern nation of Colombia, which might be bestdivided culturally into Andean-Colombian and Amazonian-Colombian areas.

5 Many of Sheets’s remarks would have to be modif ied to address the archaeological records of Colombia,Ecuador, and Venezuela, which were not included in his discussion of the Intermediate Area.

6 The civilizations of Middle America are def ined as Lowland and Highland Maya, Monte Alban, Tajín, andTeotihuacan (Willey 1959).


position of academic departments. Concepts such as Mesoamerica, the Intermediate Area,the Central Andes, and the Circum-Caribbean Area result from a particularistic andfunctionalist focus rooted in a paradigm of culture history that is heavily inf luenced bycultural evolutionary concerns, perspectives that guide their interpretation using morpho-logical characteristics of archaeological remains and their distribution. By nature, they tendto privilege certain processes, such as reliance upon domesticated food sources, centralizedauthority, and urban settlement patterns. Concerns with the origins of state societies tend toignore alternative trajectories.

In def ining an Isthmo-Colombian Area here, priority is given to the convergence ofmultiple lines of evidence and to diachronic rather than synchronic elements, specif ically thelong-term occupation of the region by endogenous populations sharing common geneticand linguistic traits for which there is evidence of continuity of occupation but limitedevidence for migration or external control. Some population movements must be acknowl-edged. These occurred when the area was f irst occupied in Paleoindian times, whenMesoamerican groups settled portions of Nicaragua and Costa Rica during the Epiclassic(Constenla 1994; Fowler 1989), when Carib populations began to occupy parts of northernColombia (Constenla 1991), and when Chocoan Emberá and Waunaan populations movedfrom Pacif ic Colombia into the Darién (Herlihy 1985; Pardo 1987). The antiquity of Chibchan-speaking populations in the Sábana de Bogotá remains a topic of some debate (Lleras 1995).Recent linguistic and genetic data, however, suggest that the principal populations of CostaRica and Panama were Chibchan speakers whose in situ lines of genetic descent may dateback more than ten thousand years.

The linguistic and human genetic patterns that can be reconstructed for the Isthmo-Colombian Area imply a long-term dynamic of sociocultural interaction within a specif icgeographic-ecological unit. The linguistic and genetic aff inities of its indigenous populationsuggest a common ancestry in terms of physical descent and consciousness. Kinship andlanguage, which tend to be highly correlated, played essential roles in conditioning contextsfor historical phenomena. Ancestral speakers of Chibchan languages, represented today byliving populations with varying degrees of indigenous linguistic and cultural identity, appearto have had shared sociocultural experiences within specif ic spatial limits over an extendedperiod of time. Here the term diffuse unity is used to refer to the effects of a cultural processdistinct from territorial political centralization or dissemination of ideology from a centralsource. This “unity” is characterized by elements of a common worldview, historical heritage,a shared succession of endogenous cultural changes, and similar realities. The endogenousprocess of social change provided a way for groups that were ancestrally related to establishnarrower relationships among themselves in territories of greater or smaller extent (Fonsecaand Cooke 1993).

Thomas Myers was one of the f irst to address the issue of early cultural relationships byfocusing on what was then called the Tecomate Tradition of Formative Nuclear America. Henotes, “Predictably what we f ind is that adjacent cultures tend to resemble each other moreclosely than they resemble more distant cultures. Conceptually, this could be viewed as aseries of overlapping cultural circles which link the civilizations at each end of the Interme-


diate Area” (Myers 1978: 205). The Isthmo-Colombian Area can be conceived as aninteraction sphere within which populations were specif ically related through genetic de-scent over time and distinguished by shared elements of a common linguistic and ethnicheritage in a context of diffuse unity, but which also had elements conditioned by a geo-graphical cline distinguishing east from west. The concept of diffuse unity does not imply theexistence of a Pax Chibcha. To the contrary, conf lict appears to have been endemic, withboundary protection and maintenance a key element in marked cultural diversity and sharpcontrasts between neighboring regions in spite of cosmological unity. This “unity with con-f lict” is similar to that expressed in the Guaymí concept of etabalí, or ritual brotherhood:

The etabalí relationship, considered as a bond of brotherhood, symbolizes, on theone hand, the union of two groups within a larger one, similar to a large kinshipgroup that requires strong feelings of hospitality and cooperation among its membersand establishes ideal notions of the comportment of relatives. On the other hand, itrepresents the lineage along whose length the fragmentation of the group is produced,with its inevitable consequences of opposition, aggression, and discord (Young1978) [authors’ translation].

The Isthmo-Colombian Area

The Isthmo-Colombian Area is def ined by populations that inhabited a geographicalarea within which is found evidence for long-term continuity in populations from Paleoindiantimes to the present. The core populations are speakers of the Chibchan language family. TheChibchan stock represents the most diverse and widely distributed language family withinwhat previous researchers have referred to as the Intermediate Area; it is distributed fromeastern Honduras to Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela,7 and includes at least twenty distinct lan-guages spoken in Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Colombia, and Venezuela (Constenla 1991:30). Because information on these populations and their languages remains incomplete andfragmentary, the exact limits of this area are poorly def ined. The Misumalpan and Chocoanlanguage families are believed to have separated from Proto-Chibchan before the separationof Chibchan prior to 7000 B.P., a time when populations were small (Constenla 1991; 1995).Linguistic commonalities among the Chibchan, Misumalpan, Chocoan, and Paézan lan-guages are best explained through their participation in a common sphere of interaction. Theuse of Chibchan languages by populations with evidence for long-term genetic relationshipsis, however, the principal marker of the Isthmo-Colombian Area.

Northern Limits. The northern limit of the Isthmo-Colombian Area is in eastern Hon-duras. The Pech (Paya) are the northernmost of the Chibchan-speaking groups (Constenla1991). Modern Pech populations are found on the north central coast of Honduras, as wellas in the Municipio Dulce Nombre de Culmí of the department of Olancho. There are also

7 Inclusion of the Orinoco is suggested by some Yanomamo linguistic and genetic data (see below).


ethnic Pech in Santa María del Carbón, but the language is nearly extinct there. Whether thePech represent a northern migration of ancient Chibchan speakers or a remnant populationfrom what was once a larger Chibchan territory is unknown. The archaeology of easternHonduras remains less well known than most other regions of the country, but there areimportant aff inities between the material culture of Selin Farm and Caribbean Costa Rica.Recent work in the Talgua Valley by James Brady and the late George Hasemann revealedthe existence of extensive mortuary remains in caves in association with substantial settle-ments, several of which have aboveground architecture (Beaudry-Corbett et al. 1997; Brady1997; Brady, Hasemann, and Fogarty 1995). Christopher Begley (n.d.) documents numerouscomplex settlements in the Dulce Nombre de Culmí region dating after A.D. 1000 andidentif ies modern Pech as the most likely descendants of the populations responsible forthese remains. There is, however, a pressing need for a genetic evaluation of Pech ancestry.

The northern frontier of the Isthmo-Colombian Area is def ined by the diffuse bound-aries that would have existed among Lenca, Jicaque, and Misumalpan languages and Chibchanlanguages. Although the former have characteristics that can be used to argue for aff initieswith Chibchan, they also have suff iciently distinct features that allow their classif ication asseparate language groups. Linguistic characteristics such as postpositions and the genitive-substantive order shared with South American populations mark a clearer border withMesoamerica (Constenla 1991: 129). Gold and tumbaga are exceptionally rare in the areaswhere these languages were spoken, although some elements of metallurgical iconographyare present in stone and pottery. This dearth may be due to an absence of raw material, butthe paucity of gold objects acquired by trade suggests that these objects did not have thesame signif icance for northern groups as they did for those of the south. However, earlySpanish references to goldworking in Taguzgalpa, a province in central-eastern Honduras,suggest the full story of gold in this region has yet to be told.

Northwestern Costa Rica is tentatively included within the Isthmo-Colombian areaon the grounds that it may have been occupied by Chibchan-speaking groups throughoutmost of its history (Constenla 1994; Fonseca 1994). This is consistent with evidence that theprincipal incursions of Oto–Manguean- and Nahuat-speaking peoples did not begin untilabout A.D. 800 for Pacif ic Nicaragua and possibly A.D. 1200 for Guanacaste (Fowler 1989). Alarge number of characteristics from earlier periods are shared with Chibchan-speaking re-gions of Costa Rica, among them goldwork (which is less well documented archaeologicallyin Pacif ic Nicaragua). The material culture of the earliest ceramic-using populations up throughthe end of the Zoned Bichrome period shares more patterns with regions to the south thanto the north. In fact, there are signif icant similarities between the earliest Formative com-plexes from western Nicaragua southward into western and central Panama.

The Core of the Isthmo-Colombian Area. Costa Rica and Panama constitute the historicalcore and the modern center of Chibchan populations. More than 95 percent of all survivingethnically indigenous Chibchan populations live in these two countries. Their total numbermay have surpassed the 500,000 estimated for the Muisca of highland Colombia (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1978: 97), the other area of demographic concentration of Chibchan speakers.


Both linguistic and genetic data suggest that Costa Rica and Panama may have been thehome of the original Proto-Chibchan speakers, giving this region the oldest Chibchan popu-lations. Chocoan populations can currently be found in Darién province, eastern Panama,and along the Pacif ic coast of northwestern Colombia (Fig. 1). The culture history of centraland eastern Panama is quite complex and includes the extinction of the Cueva (whoselinguistic identity is unclear) shortly after European contact (Romoli 1987), a reoccupationof certain parts of the territory by (Chibchan) Kuna, and more recent incursions of Chocoan-speaking Waunaan and Emberá from Pacif ic Colombia (Pardo 1987). We may never knownthe linguistic identity of the ancient populations of Parita Bay or the Santa María Valley or ofsites such as Sitio Conte or Cerro Juan Díaz (Cooke, personal communication, 1999). Kunalinguistics, genetics, and oral history, together with the existence of Chibchan speakers toboth the east and west of this zone, suggest it was partly occupied by Chibchan populationsat one time.

Adolfo Constenla Umaña has classified all of the Chibchan languages of Nicaragua,Costa Rica, and Panama into the Votic and Isthmic subfamilies. The languages in the Voticsubfamily include Rama, spoken on Rama Cay in Caribbean Nicaragua, and Maleku,8 spokenin the Llanuras de San Carlos of northern Costa Rica. The Isthmic languages range fromBribri and Cabécar in central and southern Costa Rica to Kuna, spoken in Darién and theGulf of Urabá, Colombia, to the south. The Isthmo-Colombian Area may therefore includethe eastern seaboard of Nicaragua, as represented in historic times by Rama at the mouth ofthe Río San Juan. With the exception of Maleku and the Oto-Manguean and Nahuat popu-lations in Guanacaste, that were the result of southward migrations from Chiapas, Guatemala,and Mexico in the Early Postclassic (Constenla 1994; Fowler 1989), all of the indigenouspeoples of Costa Rica spoke Chibchan languages in Constenla’s Isthmic subfamily. Theseinclude the Viceític subgroup of Cabécar and Bribri as well as Boruca and Tiribí.9 Constenlais of the opinion that the now-extinct Votos, whose territory in the sixteenth century in-cluded an intermediate geographic position between the Ramas and the Malekus, were alsoChibchan speakers. Their territory at the time of European contact appears to have beencoterminous with that of the now-extinct Huetars, the dominant Chibchan-speaking popu-lation of central Costa Rica. The most widely spoken language of sixteenth-century CostaRica was Huetar. Studies of historically documented personal names, place names, and asmall surviving vocabulary have also identif ied this extinct language as Chibchan (Quesada1990, 1992, 1996). Corobicí is another extinct language that is likely to have belonged to thisfamily.

The languages of western Panama include Tiribí, also spoken in eastern Costa Rica, themodern Guaimíic subgroup of Ngöbere,10 Movere,11 and Bocotá,12 and the virtually extinct

8 Alternatively, Guatuso.9 Alternatively, Térraba, Teribe, Tirrribi, Nortenyo, Quequexque, and Naso.10 Alternatively, (Western) Guaymí, Valiente, Chiriquí, Ngábere; (Eastern) Tolé, Chiriquí, Ngäbere’.11 Alternatively, Move.12 Alternatively, Bokota, Bogota, Bofota, Bobota, Bukueta, Buglé, Buglere, Nortenyo, Murire, Sabanero,

Veraguas Sabanero.


Doracic subgroup of Dorasque and Chánguena. Eastern Panama presents a signif icant lin-guistic frontier between Chibchan and Chocoan speakers. The principal Chibchan group isthe Kuna,13 who occupy the San Blás Islands and the Gulf of Urabá in neighboring Colom-bia. Kuna has been classif ied within the Isthmic subfamily, which includes most of the otherCosta Rican and Panamanian Chibchan languages. To the east of Kuna, Chibchan languagesare classed within the Magdalenic subfamily.

Fig. 1 Approximate areas where Chibchan (dark gray, roman type) and Chocoan (medium gray, italictype) languages are predominately spoken. Light gray areas indicate related Isthmo-Colombian terri-tories. Extinct languages are in bold.

13 Alternatively, Cuna, San Blás Kuna, Paya-Pucuro Kuna, Caiman Nuevo.


Southern and Eastern Limits. In Colombia, the Chibchan family includes languages inthe Madgdalenic subfamily, which has two basic divisions: Arhuácic and Cundicocúyic.Arhuácic includes Kogi,14 Ika,15 and Damana16 —currently spoken in the Sierra Nevada deSanta Marta—as well as Atanques. Cundicocúyic includes the extinct Muisca17 languagealong with Duit and Tunebo. Old Catío, Nutabe, and Tairona may have been languages inthis subfamily but are now extinct. The Isthmo-Colombian Area therefore includes the dis-tinctive regions of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, home to the ancient Tairona and themodern Kogi, Ika, and Damana (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1985; 1991b), the Sabana de Bogotá,the highland center of ancient Muisca society, and the Colombian departments ofCundinamarca, Boyacá, and Duitama.

The antiquity of Chibcha populations in the Sábana de Bogotá is currently a matter ofsome debate, centering on interpretations of a historical disjunction between the Herreraphase and Early Muisca populations (Langebaek 1995; Lleras 1995). The diversity that char-acterizes languages within the Isthmic subfamily is one of the principal reasons for identify-ing Costa Rica and Panama as the core of the Isthmo-Colombian Area. The greater diversityin Chibchan languages to the west and north than to the south and east suggests greaterantiquity in the former. Evidence for genetic aff inities of long duration with strong geo-graphical continuity support this interpretation.

Chimila18 and Barí19 have also been classif ied as Chibchan languages (Constenla 1991;1995), suggesting that an eastern extension of the Isthmo-Colombian Area should also in-clude territory along the western portion of Lake Maracaibo, including the Catatumba re-gion in Venezuela. These appear to have been Barí20 territory at the time of Spanish contact,and archaeological evidence of the Berlín ceramic tradition may be associated with ancestorsof the Chibchan-speaking Barí (Arvelo 1996).

The Chocoan Frontier. Among the principal cultural frontiers within the central andsouthern part of the Isthmo-Colombian Area were those between Chibchan and Chocoanspeakers. Chocoan languages are found in eastern Pacif ic Panama and southward across north-western Colombia to the Pacif ic coast as far south as the Cayapas River in Ecuador. MaryHelms notes that several scholars favor the hypothesis that “the linguistic and cultural pat-terns of at least eastern Panama . . . the lower and middle Atrato region, the Western Cordil-lera, and perhaps also the lower to middle Cauca valley could be considered a single culturalsphere” (1979: 151), citing Hermann Trimborn (1948: 47, 53, 192–193, 204) and Carl Sauer(1966: 238–239). Warwick Bray notes that “archaeologically, there is no doubt that Pacif ic

14 Alternatively, Cogui, Coghui, Cagaba, Kagaba, and Kaggaba.15 Alternatively, Arahuaco, Aruaco, Ica, Ijca, Ijka, Ika, Ike, Bíntucua, Bintuk, Bíntukua, and Pebu.16 Alternatively, Guamaca, Guamaka, Malayo, Marocacero, Marocasero, Maracaserro, Sancá, Sanja, Sanka,

Arosario, Arsario, Wiwa, Huihua.17 Alternatively, Chibcha and Mosca.18 Alternatively, Caca Weranos, San Jorge, and Shimizya.19 Alternatively, Motilón, Motilone, and Dobocubí.20 Alternatively, Dobocubí.


Darien formed a single culture province from, at latest, the time of Christ right up to theConquest. The northern frontier of this province coincides with the limit of Cueva speechnear Chame, west of the Panama Canal, and the southern boundary falls near Bahia Solano,in the Colombian Choco” (1984: 329). These territories correspond to those of Chocoanspeakers, with the exception of the Chibchan Kuna.

The Chocoan family includes Emberá and Waunaan, currently spoken in Darién. Cueva,spoken in central Panama, may have represented a strong Chocoan presence there.21 In Co-lombia, the Chocoan area is bounded to the east by the Sinú and San Jorge Rivers up to awestern line delimited by the Cauca River. The inhabitants of the Sinú and Cauca Valleysappear to have been mainly Chocoan speakers. Jacinto Jijón y Caamaño (1938) was the f irstto note the correspondence between Chocoan languages and certain archaeological remains.The distribution of Chocoan languages corresponds to the regions of the sixteenth-centurypopulation centers of Dabeiba, Finzenú, and Panzenú and to the archaeological regions ofEstorbo, Cupica, Betancí, and Calima (Constenla 1991: 48). It is at present unknown whetherthe classic Quimbaya of the Middle Cauca Valley were Chocoan or Chibchan speakers; thereare hints in favor of each.

Chocoan speakers may have played a major role in the interactions that took placefrom Quimbaya to Coclé and that resulted in similarities between Coclé and Calima gold-work. The Bay of Cupica, on the Pacif ic coast of Colombia in the heart of a Chocoanlinguistic region, appears to have played a key role in the transfer of metallurgical knowledgeand styles between the Cauca Valley and central Panama. Cupica IV burials contain importedMacaracas Polychrome vessels from Coclé in central Panama along with local wares relatedto types from Betancí (Bray 1984: 330; Reichel-Dolmatoff and Reichel-Dolmatoff 1961).That this relationship may have a long history is suggested by the pottery styles from CupicaI burials, which are decorated with plastic techniques reminiscent of La Mula-Sarigua andCerro Juan Díaz as well as sites in the Pacif ic lowlands of eastern Panama. Bray (1984: 330)hypothesizes that this ware, when it appears on the Atlantic side of Panama, may have beenimported from the Pacif ic (Drolet n.d.: 222–227).

The linguistic aff inity of the inhabitants of central Panama, particularly in the criticalzone that includes early Monagrillo ceramics, the Coclé culture, and the sixteenth-centurychiefdoms of Parita and Natá, remains unknown for lack of evidence. Very little linguisticdata was collected in this region in the sixteenth century, and few traces of indigenouslanguages survive. The strongest evidence points to external contacts and exchanges with thePacif ic coast of Colombia and the Quimbaya culture of the Middle Cauca, suggesting thatthis region may have been Chocoan rather than Chibchan. This interpretation, however, iscomplicated by similarities between La Mula/Sarigua ceramics and early pottery of east-ern Costa Rica, an area that was historically Chibchan. Archaeological evidence from the siteof El Caño, near Natá, indicates the use of rounded river cobbles to construct house moundsin a fashion similar to that in areas of Chibchan-speaking populations of Costa Rica (Fonseca

21 Constenla, disagreeing with Lehmann (1920), identif ies Cueva of eastern Panama as Chocoan, notChibchan.


and Cooke 1993). There is also circumstantial evidence of cultural continuities with modernMovere and Bocotá (Buglé) populations (Cooke, personal communication, 2001).

The Paézan/Barbacoan Frontier. The Paézan/Barbacoan languages represent a southernfrontier of the Isthmo-Colombian Area, particularly in the Upper Magdalena Valley. The siteof San Agustín is located within territory that was occupied by the Paéz at the time of thef irst Spanish contact. While Paéz has been identif ied as a Chibchan language by some re-searchers, Constenla (1991) asserts that it belongs within the Barbacoa family. This raises thequestion of whether the residents of San Agustín and Tierradentro are likely to have beenChibchan or Paézan/Barbacoan. Genetic studies of Chibchan and Paézan populations sup-port the linguistic and cultural separation of these groups (Layrisse and Rodríguez-Larraide1995).22 General similarities between San Agustín iconography and that of the Nariño re-gion of southern Colombia and Early Horizon cultures even farther south in the Andeanregion have long suggested a more southerly aff inity.

The Amazonian Frontier. Def inition of the eastern frontier of the Isthmo-Colombianregion is made problematic by conf licting data. Although Joseph Greenberg (1987) classif iesYanomami languages as Chibchan, Constenla disagrees. Genetic data reveal close groupingsof Yanomami with Barí in Venezuela, but also with Bocotá of central Panama (Layrisse andRodríguez-Larraide 1995), which are also genetically similar to Boruca, of southern CostaRica. The frontier between the Isthmo-Colombian Area and the Amazonian area is markedby traits associated with the former, such as absence of gender, location of numbers after thesubstantive, and the exclusiveness of the subject-object-verb order (Constenla 1991: 129).The nature of interactions between Amazonian groups and those to the northwest is intrigu-ing and merits further research.

Endogenous Development

Linguistic Evidence for Chibchan Origins

One of the most important contributions of linguistic studies has been the identif ica-tion of a hearth for Proto-Chibcha in southeastern Costa Rica and western Panama (Constenla1991: 43). There is greater linguistic diversity among Chibchan languages within this regionthan in areas to the north (Honduras) or the south (northern Colombia). Languages in theVótic and Isthmic subdivisions are found in southern Costa Rica and western Panama, whileonly those in the Magdalenic subdivision are found in Colombia. The beginning of thefragmentation of the Proto-Chibchan stock is estimated through glottochronology to havebegun around 4000 B.C. with the separation of Paya from the main group. The fragmentationof the Vótic, Isthmic, and Magdalenic subdivisions had begun by 3000 B.C., with these divi-sions evident by 2000 B.C. (Constenla 1995: 44). Constenla suggests that this break can betied to the beginnings of agriculture and the founding of permanent, sedentary villages, as

22 These studies contain other puzzling results.


supported by the current archaeological data. However, it is probably wise to treatglottochronological interpretations with caution.

Genetic Microevolution in the Isthmo-Colombian Area

The study of human genetic diversity has revolutionized thinking about Chibchanpopulations, especially when combined with the above-mentioned linguistic studies. A widevariety of genetic markers, including mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), confirms that Chibchan-speaking populations of Costa Rica and Panama demonstrate strong in situ reproductivecontinuity, with few external introductions from the Early Holocene to the present. Thecharacteristics of the Boruca, Bribri, Cabécar, Guatuso (Maleku), Teribe, and Kuna—Chibcha-speaking groups in southern Costa Rica and Panama—distinguish them from other popula-tions in the New World (Barrantes et al. 1990: 80; Barrantes 1993: 144–145). Cluster analysisof their genetic characteristics, linguistic characteristics, geographic distribution, and a com-bination of the three suggests close relationships among them, with aff inities ordering lin-eally among geographically neighboring populations along the isthmus. Ramiro Barrantesand his colleagues conclude, “Our results do not support the old view of the IntermediateArea (and lower Central America) as a well-traveled ‘frontier’ between ‘mother cultures’ tothe north and south. Any such explanation would require recent waves of migration fromoutside the region. While there have been cultural inf luences from both directions, waves ofmigration are not compatible with either the genetic and linguistic data or with the archaeo-logical history of the region” (Barrantes et al. 1990: 63). Their f inding thus permits one toconclude that the area in which these groups are distributed had its own, endogenous dy-namic of interaction (Barrantes et al. 1990: 80).

The persistence of an ancient, genetically circumscribed Chibchan population in thesouthern isthmus is further supported by studies of “private” polymorphisms—genetic vari-ants specif ic to particular populations—and mtDNA. Private patterns in these variants sug-gest that there were variants in the Central American Chibcha population that had beenpresent in the region from very early times and that a particular polymorphism, the Diegoantigen (DI*A), was widespread outside the region but absent within it. The virtual absenceof DI*A, high frequencies of antigens TF*D-CHI and PEPA*F (6PGD*C), and polymor-phic frequencies of f ive regionally restricted variants support “the idea that the peoples ofthis region have developed in situ over a very long period of time, without major intrusionsfrom the outside” (Layrisse and Wilbert 1961). Barrantes and his colleagues note that “someof the continuity almost surely represents exchange among neighboring groups over the past10,000 years, but the clustering within the Central American Chibcha is almost certainlydue to phyletic f ission” (Barrantes et al. 1990: 20). A study of twenty-two Chibchan andPaézan groups conf irms a general, but not perfect, correspondence between linguistic andgenetic patterns, highlighting genetic aff iliations among f ifteen linguistically distinct Chibchanpopulations (Layrisse and Rodríguez-Larraide 1995). Furthermore, “the analyses of the fre-quencies and distribution of polymorphic markers indicates an antiquity for the group of atleast 7000 years. This supports the hypothesis that there was an in situ development in the


region, with a certain degree of genetic f low, or mixing between tribes, with preferencesgiven to neighboring groups. This also favors an evolutionary model of a certain circum-scribed space that did not experience great movements from north to south” (Barrantes1998: 8).

Data from mtDNA conf irm the genetic distinctiveness of Isthmian Chibchan popula-tions (Torroni et al. 1994).23 An analysis of the mtDNA of 110 Chibchan speakers showstheir genetic characteristics to be signif icantly different from non-Chibchan groups. Of thef ifteen haplotypes observed, all but four are unique to Chibchan populations. Furthermore,the range of mtDNA variation within the Chibchan group suggests a long and relativelyindependent process of genetic divergence, further supporting models for long-term au-tochthonous evolution within southern Central America. Additional mtDNA studies ofChibchan groups reveal a relatively low level of diversity, suggesting that they are descendedfrom a specif ic, small founding population that was relatively isolated from genetically differ-ent populations (Batista et al. 1998: 15). Research on mtDNA from a remnant “Huetar”(Chibchan) population in Quitirrisí, Costa Rica, supports these assertions (Santos et al. 1994).Features of mtDNA and nuclear DNA indicate an initial reduction of genetic variation fromthe original founding population (Paleoindians of North American and ultimately Asianorigin) and an increase in variation due to the subsequent appearance of new private vari-ants, at least one of which is considered to be more recent than 8000 B.P. (Santos et al. 1994:973). This analysis, together with the earlier recognition of serum protein variants, demon-strates “that the Huetar harbor polymorphisms of considerable antiquity, suggesting an earlydivergence from the regional founder gene pool for this population” (ibid.: 963). The re-searchers conclude that “the results argue for an in situ evolution of around 60% of themtDNA variability” (ibid.: 975) supporting their view based on the presence of privategenetic variants of a relatively isolated evolution of Chibchan populations.

A study of serum proteins from the Guaymí, Bribri, Cabécar, Teribe, Guatuso (Maleku),and Quitirrisí “Huetar” not only supports the clear separation of these Chibchan speakersfrom other Amerindian populations, but also conf irms their variability as individually dis-tinct populations (Bieber et al. 1996). The researchers conclude, “The two tribes of theTalamancan subgroup (Bribri and Cabécar) are closely related and are distant from the clus-ter of the Guatuso and Huetar tribes. These four tribes form a cluster with respect to theirrelations to the Teribe and the Guaymí, which are more or less loosely related to each other. . . . [This] means that most of the subpopulations show relative reproductive isolation andthat only between neighbors are there some aff inities” (ibid.: 950).24 The implication of thisdata is that although there is substantial evidence for the long-term in situ evolution ofChibchan populations, there is also evidence for long-term maintenance of reproductiveboundaries among them. This latter hints at the importance of distinct group identitieswithin the Isthmo-Colombian Area.

23 The Torroni study did not include South American Chibchan speakers.24 Ironically, Bieber and her colleagues use the label Mesoamerican to identify the Chibchan groups, although

their genetic relationships to Mesoamerican or South American neighbors were not specif ically examined.


A Holistic Approach to the Isthmo-Colombian Area

Although the data from linguistic and genetic research are impressive, they also haveserious limitations. One group notes, “What emerges from our work in Central AmericanChibcha-speaking peoples is that the more we know about the groups in question—theirdemography, their geography, their history, their linguistic aff inities, and their social dynam-ics—the better we can make sense of the genetic data we have. . . . Molecular characterizationis useful, but it is no substitute for contextual understanding” (Thompson et al. 1992: 624).Conf irmation of the patterns emerging from linguistic and genetic studies must come froma holistic approach to the area that synthesizes this data in the context of independent linesof evidence from ethnography, ethnohistory, and archaeology.

Archaeological models have long supported the notion of long-term populationcontinuity in the central Isthmo-Colombian Area. Fonseca and Cooke note that the ar-chaeological evidence argues against signif icant invasions or migrations in southern CentralAmerica on the basis of regional stability in space and time, shared cosmovision and tech-nologies, the primary importance of kinship in social and political relationships, the self-suff iciency of many territories, extensive commercial networks for common and luxuryitems, the scarcity of sites with monumental architecture, and the conspicuous absence ofstate societies (Fonseca and Cooke 1993). Northern Colombia has similarly long sequencesof occupation, especially in ceramic complexes following the f irst appearance of potteryaround 6000 B.C. This continuity is not as clear in the Chibchan regions of northern Colombia.Evidence of population incursion and displacement in the Cauca and Magdalena Valleys andthe origins of the Muisca in the Sabana de Bogotá are the subjects of current debate. RobertoLleras Pérez suggests that evidence for differences in phases of occupation of the easternAndes indicates waves of population movement from the isthmus into northern Colombiaand eastern Venezuela (Lleras 1995; Sáenz and Lleras 1999).

Diffuse Unity in Chibchan Iconography

Fonseca (1998; 1994) has provided summaries of continuities within the Isthmo-Co-lombian Area from Paleoindian times to the sixteenth century in terms of lithic assem-blages, ceramic assemblages, subsistence patterns, and settlement patterns. The focus here ison iconographic continuities that merit further discussion. The evidence for strong linguis-tic, genetic, and archaeological continuity raises the question of whether there was also apersistence of ideas and symbols representative of diffuse unity among Isthmo-Colombianpopulations. Given the antiquity of shared heritage and the absence of unifying politicalentities in the late periods, it seems more likely that any diffuse unity in the use of goldobjects may be representative of the kinds of successful ideologies manifest in the great stylesof Mesoamerica and the Central Andes. Richard Cooke and Warwick Bray were the f irst todef ine the “International Style” of gold and tumbaga artifacts, noting that similar forms weredistributed from the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, the Sinú Valley and Gulf of Urabá north-


ward into Costa Rica (Cooke and Bray 1985). Bray later notes, “From the early centuries A.D.until about 900, the vast region from central Colombia to northern Costa Rica (a straight-line distance of about 800 miles) was one metallurgical province” (Bray 1992: 39). Thedistribution of the International Style conforms roughly to that of historically documentedChibchan- and Chocoan-speaking peoples in northern Colombia and the southern CentralAmerican isthmus, and hence the core of the Isthmo-Colombian Area. The regionalizationof gold styles after A.D. 900 maintained a continuity of content, if not form, in the expressionof commonly held ideas and leitmotifs about the cosmos, shamanism, and mythology. AsBray states, “the prediction of a pan-Chibchan belief-system seems to be conf irmed” (1997).

A diffuse unity of traditions is demonstrated by iconographic themes found through-out the Isthmo-Colombian Area. These themes persisted for more than f ifteen hundred yearsin some parts of the region. While it is diff icult to identify specif ic meanings of these themes,and it is important to keep in mind that similarities in form may not signal similarities inmeaning, their presence in goldwork and other media suggests a greater ideological coher-ence throughout the region than has been heretofore suggested. This cannot be attributed topolitical unity, and explanations linked to trade networks fail to explain why certain icono-graphic elements persisted while others did not. This is especially true for those themeswhose appearance, at least in the isthmus, precedes the use of gold metallurgy.

Cooke and Bray (1985) suggest that the objects they place within the InternationalGroup were widely distributed in part because they were not tied to a particular ideology.They state, “The iconography, stressing simple realistic animal and human f igures, may havebeen widely acceptable because of its lack of specif ic imagery or mythology” (Cooke andBray 1985: 42). Bray further suggests that “the International Group was ideologically non-aligned and therefore more widely acceptable” (Bray 1992). Although objects of the Interna-tional Group may have been politically nonaligned, they may have been widely acceptedprecisely because they were linked to a general cosmological repertoire, malleable to localsituations. Bray suggests that the basic elements of a cosmology persisted across the Isthmo-Colombian Area from perhaps the f irst centuries A.D. until the time of the conquest (and insome places for several centuries afterward).

In addition to the elements of the International Style def ined by Cooke and Bray,several other themes appear in the goldwork of the Isthmo-Colombian Area, including inthe Conte and Veraguas–Gran Chiriquí groups as well as in the Sinú, Tairona, and Muiscastyles. Although expression of these themes varies widely, their reproduction represents adiffuse unity in elements of cosmology and worldview, the roots of which may ultimatelyderive from a common linguistic and genetic heritage whose manifestations were reinforcedby ongoing historical interactions in similar environmental settings. These themes, and themedium of gold, played a critical role in structuring power by emphasizing or implyingcontinuities in ideology between actors in the present and those in the past. They facilitatedthe communication of heritage, even among individuals from different cultures within theIsthmo-Colombian world (Helms 1992).


Meditative Shaman

One of the most prominent of these themes features a f igure in either a meditative stateor undertaking personal acts associated with the practice of shamanism (Fig. 2). The individual’shands are often holding rattles, gourds, or double-scroll paraphernalia. He is usually depictedunclothed, adorned with a necklace, leg ligatures, and simple headgear (often in the form ofa conical cap). The individual is shown either standing or seated, facing forward with atranquil gaze characterized by narrowed eyes—characteristically represented by horizontallids—and similarly portrayed pursed lips. Among the distinctive conventions used for thisform are broad, angular shoulders and bent or curved elbows. The clearest and best-knownrepresentations of this theme are on f inely crafted gold poporos, or lime containers, from thetreasure of the Quimbayas, removed from two graves at La Soledad, Filandia, in the MiddleCauca Valley of Colombia in 1891 (Fig. 2b) (Bray 1978: nos. 358, 360). They are shownholding gourds with lime dippers or paraphernalia with double or quadruple spirals (Bray1978: nos. 379, 380). The dating of these containers is problematic, but present estimatesplace them between A.D. 400 and 1000 (Bray 1978: 51).

This theme also appears in the stone statues from Barriles, in Chiriquí, Panama (Figs.2a, c) (Stirling 1950; Vidal 1971). The broad, angular shoulders, front-facing pose, and sparseattire (a necklace and a conical cap), as well as the distinctive representation of the f igure’sface relate these to the roughly contemporaneous Quimbaya f igures. These f igures have beeninterpreted as centralized leaders in a “man-over-slave” motif (Haberland 1984), but couldalso represent respected elders being transported in themes related to dances or mythologicalevents (Hoopes 1996). It is important to note that the majority of the Barriles f igures aresingle, standing individuals. Several wear small human f igures around their necks (Figs. 2a, c,f ). Matthew Stirling (1950) suggests that these might be gold f igures, but gold has yet to bedocumented in associated contexts in western Panama. Their size and lack of stylizedrepresentation make them distinct from Veraguas or Diquís f igures that might date tothis period. If they represent gold ornaments, the shapes and sizes of the f igures worn bythe Barriles statues are most similar to the Quimbaya objects with which they sharestylistic elements. The fashion in which the Barriles statues wear these human f igures isespecially reminiscent of the way that a Quimbaya f igure wears a poporo (Fig. 2b) (Bray1978: no. 358).25 The dating of the Barriles statuary is problematic, but most likely fallsbetween A.D. 200–600 (Hoopes 1996). Although the chronology of the Barriles statues andthe Quimbaya f igures remains problematic, a parsimonious interpretation would have themcontemporaneous at around A.D. 400–600. This is also contemporaneous with the Cerro JuanDíaz burials, which contain materials related to this theme (Sánchez n.d.). The MeditativeShaman is also represented in stone sculpture reportedly from Azúl de Turrialba, Costa Rica(Fig. 2e) (Benson 1981: no. 194).

25 Alternatively, these small f igures may be made of jade or greenstone, in a form that may predate theQuimbaya f igures and is not associated with coca use. A jade f igure of appropriate form and size is reported fromHakiuv, Talamanca (Benson 1981: 143, pl. 75).

a

b c

d e

f g h


Note that the use of a small, conical cap to designate occupation, rank, or status iswidespread throughout the Isthmo-Colombian Area. It is found on the Quimbaya humanf igures in burials at Sitio Conte (Lothrop 1937: f igs. 113, 114, and 148f ), on ceramic f iguresfrom the Diquís Delta (Lothrop 1963: f ig. 50b), and on stone statuary from Barriles (Stirling1950; Vidal 1971) and Las Mercedes (Mason 1945: pl. 45D). The woven, conical cap worn byIka holy men and Kogi mama (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990: pl. XIIa; Reichel-Dolmatoff 1991a:103, 105, 110) probably represents a survival of this ancient tradition (Fig. 2g–h). The capitself has metaphorical links to the shapes of initiation huts and the thatched roofs of Kogitemples and houses (Fig. 3) (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990: pls. VII, XIV, XXXII; Reichel-Dolmatoff1991a: 101, 108).

Spiral Ornaments

Among the objects associated with the Meditative Shaman theme are double-spiralwands, usually found on staffs and nose ornaments (Fig. 4) (Bray 1978: nos. 312–318). Thesimplest representation of the spiral appears in some of the earliest goldwork from the isth-mus, as represented by nose ornaments from Cerro Juan Díaz (Sánchez n.d.). Cooke andBray (1985) place the double-spiral nose ornament in the Initial Group (A.D. 1–500) (Bray1992: 34). One was recovered from a burial near La Fortuna, Costa Rica, where it was foundwith tumbaga artifacts in Quimbaya and Tairona styles (Baudez and Coe 1966; Stone andBalser 1965). Another was found in a tomb in the Tonosí region of Panama (González 1971).Spiral ornaments are also known from the Tairona, Sinú, and Gulf of Urabá regions. Spiralelements remain a ubiquitous element in the goldwork of the Isthmo-Colombian Area asparts of headgear and ceremonial paraphernalia.

Figures presented frontally holding staffs with double spirals appear in goldwork of theDiquís, Quimbaya, and the Tairona. A Tairona pendant suggests that the staffs are related tothe overhead spirals that also appear on these f igures, especially the pair rising directly fromthe f igure’s head (Fig. 4c) ( Jones 1985: no. 44). The meanings of these staffs are unclear, butKogi mama use objects in the form of twisted loops and rods (pipíska) to provide instructionsto novices about such celestial events as solstices, equinoxes, and lunar phases (Fig. 4d).26

These recall double-spiral elements of tumbaga ornaments (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990: pls.XXXIII, XXXVIII).

Fig. 2 opposite The Meditative Shaman theme: (a) human eff igy statuary (note neck ornament onupper f igure), Barriles, Chiriquí, Panama (Cavatrunci and Terenzi 1992: no. 341); (b) seated man,Quimbaya style, Filandia, Quindio (Treasure of the Quimbayas), Colombia (Bray 1978: no. 358); (c)human stone sculpture (note human eff igy neck ornaments), Barriles, Chiriquí, Panama (Vidal 1971);(d) (Bray 1978: no. 380); (e) human stone sculpture, central Costa Rica (Benson 1981: 62); (f ) deco-rated monumental metate (note neck ornaments), Barriles, Chiriquí Panama (Linares, Sheets, andRosenthal 1975); (g) Kogi mama, the high priest of Mamaróngo, Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta,Colombia (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990: pl. XII); (h) Ika mama (note conical sisal hat), Sierra Nevada deSanta Marta, Colombia (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1991a: 103).

26 “It is essentially a model of solstices and equinoxes, the two hoops representing the extreme solar

a

b

Fig. 3 (a) Bribri palenque residence of the late 19th century, Talamanca, Costa Rica (Hartman1991: 28). (b) The main temple of the Kogi settlement at Takina, Sierra Nevada de SantaMarta, Colombia (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990: pl. VII).


Double-Headed Saurian

The theme of a double-headed reptile (Fig. 5) has a broad distribution across time andspace. While not conf ined to the Isthmo-Colombian Area, it is perhaps the theme with thelongest chronological duration and the widest geographical distribution. This f igure is mostoften represented not as a double-headed serpent, but as a bicephalic crocodile or caiman. Itcan be depicted alone, but it has its greatest signif icance when it is used to frame or accentuateanother f igure. The double-headed saurian can appear either above, below, or in both locationsrelative to a central f igure. The motif is found on ceramics, volcanic stone sculpture, jade, andgoldwork.

The most recognizable elements of the double-headed saurian iconography are thenose and mouth with teeth. In its most stylized form, only these are included, to the exclusionof any references to body, scutes (the jagged skin of the crocodile), or even eyes. The nose isinvariably represented as a curl as a reference to the portion of the animal’s body that isvisible while it lurks beneath the surface of still water. These images are clearly derived fromfull-f igure representations, one of the best examples of which is found on a f lying-panelmetate, reportedly from San Rafael de Coronado, in the central highlands of Costa Rica (Fig.5a) (Benson 1981: no. 147; Graham 1992: f ig. 4), dated to ca. 400–700 A.D.

The double-headed saurian is also featured prominently in a painted design on a seatedGalo Polychrome f igure from Bagaces, Guanacaste, Costa Rica (Fig. 5h), probably dating toA.D. 500 and shown wearing what may be jade ear f lares, a jade axe pendant suspended fromhis neck, and gold disks with circular repoussé designs on his chest, arms, and legs.27 The useof this theme lasts well past the Spanish conquest. A wood carving in the form of a double-headed saurian taken from a seventeenth-century Kogi adoratorio in the Sierra Nevada deSanta Marta is preserved at the Museo Missionario-Etnologico of the Vatican (Fig. 5b)(Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990: pls. XLIII, XLVa; Uribe T. 1996: 30).

In some cases, the double-headed saurian is an isolated motif, as on a pair of tweezersfrom Costa Rica (Fig. 5d) (Karpinsky de Murillo 1997: no. 274) and a bell from Sitio Conte(Hearne and Sharer 1992: pl. 43). It is also common as an element of headdresses (Karpinskyde Murillo 1997: nos. 252, 253, 268, 269), including an example on a Darién-style pendant(Bray 1992: f ig. 3.5). Other times, it appears as an appendage or accent to a larger theme,emerging from heads or thighs of human f igures ( Jones 1985: no. 102), from the mouth of afrog (Deletaille and Deletaille 1992: f ig. 254), or from its legs (Karpinsky de Murillo 1997:no. 238). The serpent feet of a jade f igure from Hakiuv, Talamanca, also echo this theme

positions. The object is used as a mnemonic device, and as a seasonal and monthly sky calendar on which allritual dates can be ‘read’ and foretold. The artifact is also used during the process of twisting the yarn for thebraided cords that are sewn on men’s garments, and which symbolize umbilic cords and union with the Mother.The braiding of these cords signif ies alliance, unity, balance” (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990).

27 Interestingly, the objects that he is wearing are duplicated in deposits at the site of Finca Linares, whichcontained greenstone ear f lares, an axe pendant, and a gold disk as well as a tumbaga human f igurine withfeatures in common with Quimbaya f igurines and f lying panel metates (Herrera 1998).

a

b

d

c

e


(Benson 1981: pl. 75, no. 177). An association of the double-headed saurian with transforma-tion and f light is found in a tumbaga bat pendant from Sitio Conte, Panama, with wingsrepresented by stylized saurian heads (Fig. 5g) (Hearne and Sharer 1992: pl. 18), a theme thatalso appears on a jade pendant from Guanacaste, Costa Rica (Benson 1981: pl. 86, no. 37).

A variant of the double-headed reptilian is a belt that terminates in two snake heads.One of the clearest examples of this form appears on an embossed plaque from Sitio Conte(Fig. 5i) (Hearne and Sharer 1992: pl. 1) on a f igure who also has prominent leg ligatures(Graham, in this volume).

Beak Birds

Birds with long, prominent beaks are ubiquitous in the goldwork of the Isthmo-Co-lombian Area (Fig. 6). The nature of the representations does not permit specif ic identif ica-tion of species, but long, curving beaks are suggestive of toucans, vultures, or possiblyhummingbirds. “Beak bird” iconography f irst appears in Costa Rica as a theme in Pavas andEl Bosque phase pottery (Benson 1981: pls. 25, 26) (Calvo et al. 1995: no. 137; Karpinsky deMurillo 1997: no. 164) and axe god pendants (Benson 1981: pl. 67, 80–83) during the f irstcenturies B.C.28 It is a distinctive element of Costa Rican f lying-panel metates, where theyare sometimes shown pecking on human heads (Benson 1981: pl. 51; Graham 1992: f ig. 9).Present in the Initial Group, long-beaked birds are one of the earliest themes in Chibchangoldwork. They continue as common representations on Veraguas–Gran Chiriquí goldwork(Fig. 6h–i) (Lothrop 1950) and in Sinú staff heads (Fig. 6d) (Falchetti 1995: f igs. 1–14). Birdsare an element of Gerardo Reichel-Dolmatoff ’s Icon A (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1988), which isspecif ically associated with shamanistic practices. Multiple beaked birds often accompanyhuman f igures on Tairona tumbaga pendants (Fig. 6e) (Bray 1978: no. 263; Jones 1985: no.44). An individual who has dual head eminences and a splayed-tail bird pendant is found ona repoussé Tairona pectoral, reportedly from the bank of the Río Piedras, Santa Marta,Magdalena, Colombia (Bray 1978: no. 307) (note that this f igure is squatting above a double-headed serpent motif ). Multiple beak birds also appear in Muisca and Tairona pendants (Bray1978: no. 309), including the Mazaruni Dragon found in Guyana (Fig. 6f ) (Whitehead 1990,1996). Beak birds survive in goldwork as the oft-mentioned águilas of the conquest period

Fig. 4 opposite The double-spiral theme: (a) human-eff igy lime f lask, Quimbaya, Colombia (Bray 1978:no. 379); (b) transformed human holding spiral ornaments on tumbaga pendant, Palmar Sur, Diquís,Costa Rica (Fernández and Faith 1991: pl. 11); (c) masked-f igure pendant, Tairona culture, Colombia( Jones 1985: no. 44); (d) double-spiral nose ornament, Tairona culture, Colombia (Bray 1978: no. 318);(e) pipíska, “sky calendar made of hoops and rods” in the rafters of a Kogi house, Sierra Nevada deSanta Marta, Colombia (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990: pl. XXXVIII);

28 Note that this is contemporaneous with the prominence of the Maya Principal Bird Deity iconography,to which it may be related, in areas of eastern and southern Guatemala (Parsons 1986).

a b

c

d

e

f

g

hi


(Ibarra, in this volume), and many of them may represent harpy eagles although their dispro-portionate beaks retain the appearance of other species.

Crocodile Man

As Bray notes, the Crocodile God is one of the oldest and most widely recognized ofthemes in Chibcha art and one of the most ubiquitous characters in the artwork of SitioConte. It was present before A.D. 500, represented in the earliest graves at the site (Bray 1992:43). According to Bray, “The survival of this Crocodile God as the principal icon for morethan a thousand years (in Old World terms, from the Late Roman Empire to the voyages ofColumbus) demonstrates that the belief-system of the native Panamanians was almost as oldas the Christian religion that came to replace it” (Bray 1992: 46). In Costa Rica, anthropo-morphic f igures with crocodile heads appear in f lying-panel metates and carved jade (somewith conical caps) (Benson 1981: no. 158) and continue to be a prominent theme in goldworkfrom Costa Rica, Panama, and Colombia.

Several artistic conventions are commonly found in representations of the CrocodileMan (Fig. 7). One of these is accentuated shoulders, either squared or peaked. As notedabove, such shoulders are also found in the Meditative Shaman theme. Another is the depic-tion of bent elbows in an unnaturalistic U shape. One of the clearest examples of this latterconvention appears on a f lying-panel metate reported to come from San Rafael de Coronado,Costa Rica (Fig. 7a) (Graham 1992: f ig. 4). Another comes from a metate reportedly from LaUnion de Guápiles, in the Caribbean lowlands (Fig. 6e) (Graham 1992: f ig. 8). Each has ananthropomorphic f igure with a crocodile head. The former stands on a double-headed croco-dile while the latter stands on a jaguar. The distinctive combination of squared shoulders andcurved elbows on a frontal f igure appears on goldwork of the Veraguas–Gran Chiriquí style( Jones 1985: no. 106). (This f igure also has stylized antlers reminiscent of Coclé artwork.)One f igure from the Chiriquí region has a double-saurian headdress ( Jones 1985: no. 6);another displays deer antlers ( Jones 1985: no. 3). Hands are often represented in the samemanner as on the metates, with semicircular palms and stylized, parallel f ingers executed infalse f iligree. The Costa Rican f lying-panel metates are dated to between the f irst and seventh

Fig. 5 opposite The double-headed saurian theme: (a) f lying-panel metate with double-headed croco-dile motive from San Rafael de Coronado, Costa Rica (Cavatrunci and Terenzi 1992: 247); (b) double-headed saurian, wooden sculpture, 17th century, Kogi culture, Colombia (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1990:pl. XLVa); (c) double-headed crocodile of jade, northwestern Costa Rica (Calvo, Bonilla, and Sánchez1992: no. 55); (d) gold tweezers with double-headed saurian motif, Diquís, Costa Rica (Karpinsky deMurillo 1997: no. 274); (e) bat/crocodile pendant of greenstone from Costa Rica (Calvo, Bonilla, andSánchez 1992: no. 76); (f ) masked-f igure pendant, Diquís, Costa Rica ( Jones 1985: no. 10); (g) bat/crocodile pendant, Sitio Conte, Panama (Hearne and Sharer 1992: pl. 19); (h) human-eff igy vesselwith double-headed saurian motifs, Galo Polychrome, northwestern Costa Rica (Benson 1981: cover);(i) gold disk from Sitio Conte, Panama (note double-headed belt) (Hearne and Sharer 1992: pl. 1).

ab c

d

e

fg

h i


centuries, indicating that this stylistic convention, when it appears in goldwork dating fromthe tenth through the sixteenth centuries, is one that may have endured for almost a millen-nium. The particular hand shape of the f igures on these objects, however, raises some chro-nological questions. While the U-shaped hand with long, narrow f ingers makes sense in falsef iligree goldwork—note that this convention is also utilized in Muisca tunjo f igures ( Jones1985: no. 42), which also have square shoulders, U-shaped elbows, and faces that recall thoseof the Meditative Shaman—its representation in stone is less intuitive. This raises the possi-bility that the designs on f lying-panel metates are derived from goldwork, rather than thereverse, and that at least these elaborate examples may date much later than previously thought.(The circular objects in the hands of these f igures may be repoussé gold disks.)

The Crocodile Man is frequently associated with the double-headed saurian motif, ason the metate from San Rafael de Coronado (Fig. 7a) and an example of goldwork in theDiquís–Gran Chiriquí style featuring a Crocodile Man framed with stylized double-headedreptiles above and below him (Fig. 7b) (Benson 1981: no. 273).

Bat Man

Bat Men have been identif ied by Anne Legast (1993) in Tairona goldwork on the basisof a triangular, leaf-nose element and spread wings. Other iconographic conventions associ-ated with bat f igures include crescent-shaped wings, such as those on a conical ceramic stoolfrom the Chiriquí region, decorated with a frontal image of a bat with stylized wings in thestyle of Veraguas-Diquís goldwork (MacCurdy 1911: pl. XLVId). Representations of bats ingold from Palmar Sur, Costa Rica, are anatomically incorrect in their placement of claws butinclude the crescent-wing convention in more realistic representations (Benson 1981: no.263).

The Bat Man is a prominent f igure in Tairona goldwork, where this character is shownholding the double-scroll (pipíska?) paraphernalia (Fig. 4c). Humans transformed into batshave been identif ied as representative of shamanistic f light, in which the essence of the batbecomes a guiding force in shamanistic power. Bats and birds appear to be conceptuallylinked in some Chibchan thought. For example, the Kogi classify them as nocturnal birds(Legast 1987: 49). These representations may be of a specif ic type of shaman. María StellaGonzález de Pérez (1996: 49) has recently identif ied the term supquaquyn (glossed as brujo incolonial dictionaries) for “bat-priest” in Muisca terminology.

Fig. 6 opposite The beaked bird theme: (a) pot stand with beak birds and frogs, Atlantic Watershed,Costa Rica (Calvo Mora, Bonilla, and Sánchez 1995: no. 137); (b) jade bird pendant, Costa Rica(Calvo Mora, Bonilla, and Sánchez 1995: no. 94); (c) f lying-panel metate with beak birds, centralCosta Rica (Deletaille and Deletaille 1992: f ig. 247); (d) bird-eff igy staff head, Sinú style, Colombia(Bray 1978: no. 236); (e) triple-bird pendant, Muisca style, Colombia (1992: 63, M4); (f ) Mazarunipectoral, Muisca style, Venezuela (Whitehead 1990); (g) bird pendant, Tairona, Minca, Santa Marta,Colombia (Bray 1978: no. 299); (h) bird pendant, Diquís, Costa Rica (Calvo Mora, Bonilla, andSánchez 1995: no. 102); (i) bird pendant, Veraguas, Panama (Lothrop 1950: f ig. 72b).

ab

c

e

d

f


Complex Combinations

Figures manifesting elements of multiple themes are among the most powerful imagesin goldwork from the Chibcha area. The standing f igure from Puerto González Víquez,Costa Rica (Fig. 6b) (Benson 1981: no. 293), has the stance and head spirals that often appearon the Meditative Shaman, the curled nose, grimacing mouth, and U-shaped hands of theCrocodile Man, a leaf nose and crescent shapes on his thighs that recall the Bat Man, and adouble-headed snake represented by heads on his chest connected by a twisted cord thatruns through his mouth. The themes represented here are also manifest in Tairona Bat Manshaman f igures.

Summary

That the themes discussed here—the Meditative Shaman, double-headed saurians, beakbirds, spiral ornaments, the Crocodile Man, and the Bat Man—appear throughout the Isthmo-Colombian Area in iconographic contexts suggests a diffuse unity of belief systems charac-terized by the way elements of ecology were used within structures of thought in areaswhere populations shared genetic and linguistic ancestry. Their antiquity, stretching back tothe f irst centuries B.C.—at least two thousand years before the arrival of Europeans—is sug-gestive of early, widespread belief systems that incorporated related, common mythologies.Their persistence in the context of Chibchan-speaking populations and relative absencebeyond their boundaries suggests that these themes’ recognition and use were a signif icantcomponent of areal identity.

Isthmo-Colombian Variations

Although there are a number of elements indicative of diffuse unity in religious andiconographic traditions within the Isthmo-Colombian Area, agricultural systems reveal bothcontinuities and divisions. There is a great deal of unity throughout the region with respectto the use of specif ic agricultural products. Root crops, for example, were a staple. Tree crops,such as pejibaye (Bactris gasipaes), are found everywhere but in the highlands of the Muiscapopulations. Chichas were consumed throughout the Isthmo-Colombian Area. In fact, theuse of maize primarily for making chicha may be a characteristic that separates this area fromMesoamerica, where maize was used primarily for masa to make tortillas and tamales. Chichaswere made from products as varied as guanabana (Annona sp.) and pejibaye. This suggests that

Fig. 7 opposite The Crocodile Man theme: (a) f lying-panel metate from San Rafael de Coronado,central Costa Rica (note f igure with upraised hands) (Cavatrunci and Terenzi 1992: 247); (b) “croco-dile man” f igure, Diquís, Costa Rica (Benson 1981: pl. 100); (c) human-eff igy pendant, Veraguas orDirquís (note angled shoulders and U-shaped elbows) ( Jones 1985: no. 11); (d) human-eff igy pendant,BCCR Cat. No. 300 (Cavatrunci and Terenzi 1992: 285); (e) human-eff igy tumbaga pendant (notecircles in palms), Finca Linares, Guanacaste, Costa Rica (Herrera 1998: f ig. 9b); (f ) f lying-panel metatefrom La Union de Guápiles (detail) (Benson 1981: pl. 51).


their use was one that is quite ancient, dating perhaps before the production of ceramics(Hoopes 1995).

There are some signif icant cultural differences in plant use within the area, espe-cially between the Isthmian Chibchan groups to the west of the present-day Chocoanarea and the Colombian Chibchan groups to the east. For example, ethnographic andethnohistoric evidence highlights the importance of cacao for the western groups, whoused it for a beverage prepared on special occasions. It is not known when cacao wasf irst used, but it was probably consumed in f inely crafted serving vessels, such as the tallAfrica Tripods of the Atlantic Watershed region (Benson 1981: pl. 34). It was still considereda high-status ritual beverage by Talamancan peoples at the time of Doris Stone’s ethnographicf ieldwork (Stone 1961).

Coca, on the other hand, was a fundamental element in the ritual life of the ColombianChibchan-speaking populations. One does not need to delve far into Kogi ethnographybefore the signif icance of coca is abundantly evident (Reichel-Dolmatoff 1985; 1988). Theearliest indirect evidence for its usage is the presence of poporos (lime containers) and limedipping sticks in the Calima and Quimbaya cultures of Colombia (Cardale de Schrimpff etal. 1992), probably in the f irst centuries B.C. While there are a few references to what mayhave been examples of coca use in western Panama and Costa Rica, evidence of coca culti-vation is practically nonexistent, and it seems clear that coca never had the central role forIsthmian Chibchan populations that it did for those of northern Colombia.

Chiriquí represents the easternmost extension of domesticated cacao, while Dariénrepresents the northern- and westernmost extension of coca cultivation. One explanationmay be ecological. The dry regions of central Panama were unsuitable for the cultivation ofeither cacao or coca. The north coast of Colombia is also a poor region for the cultivation ofcacao. It remains diff icult, however, to reconcile the relative absence of coca use in CentralAmerica and the relative absence of cacao consumption in Colombia with the apparentlyabundant evidence of interregional exchange of goldwork—especially in the context ofshamanism—and the continuity of relationships between Isthmian and South AmericanChibchan populations.

An alternative explanation is that the importance of coca and cacao in these respectiveregions postdates the formation of the core cosmologies shared by Chibchan-speaking peoplesdistributed roughly north and east of the Chibchan-Chocoan frontiers. As these productsbecame integral to the lifeways of peoples of the isthmus and northern Colombia, they wereincorporated into respective cosmologies as an overlay onto more ancient belief systems. Inessence, the iconographic themes are quite ancient, but their associations with specif ic prac-tices are more recent.

Conclusions

Bray was especially impressed by two aspects of what he terms an Isthmian InteractionSphere, extending from Yucatan (specif ically Chichén Itzá) to central Colombia: the “fron-tiers between discrete cultural provinces remain constant for very long periods,” and there


was constant contact between cultures in such a way that “the overall pattern does not justifyany simplistic division into donor and recipient cultures” (Bray 1984: 308). It is possible thatanother characteristic is the existence of a pan-Chibcha worldview whose origins may betraced to a historical, nuclear population of Chibchan speakers distributed between easternHonduras and northern Colombia. The extent to which this was shared with Chocoan andMisumalpan speakers remains to be explored.

Common roots suggest that much of the variation in social organization found insixteenth-century Chibchan populations evolved in the context of peoples who shared acommon linguistic and genetic heritage in the distant past. The motifs that appear in the goldiconography of the last millennium of the Pre-Columbian era ref lect not only complexnetworks of communication, but expressions of common ideas, structures of thought, andexplanations of the universe developed by populations that shared a common ancestry. Theevidence that these ideas antedate the use of gold, together with strong evidence for autoch-thonous change, suggest that ideological and social structures associated with gold use echothose of earlier communities. These patterns are ones that, unlike those of Mesoamerica andthe Central Andes, retained the signif icance of shamanistic practices such as have becomeevident in Olmec and Chavín traditions but did not rely upon the ideology of a patrilinealsuccession of centralized rule.

There are a number of themes that resonate across both media and styles. Gold andtumbaga artifacts bear iconographic evidence of a continuity of elements whose originsantedate the widespread use of gold and tumbaga and may therefore be tied to a commoncultural heritage. In gold use, the medium is less important than the message, but gold be-comes the favored material with which to communicate ancient and widely held ideas aboutthe relationships among humans, the cosmos, and the natural and supernatural realms. Goldcommunicates the power of knowledge as held by trained shamans and visionaries, who arelikely to have designed and manufactured many of the gold pieces themselves.29 This wasone that linked kinship, mythology, and worldviews conditioned by language and history.Most important, gold translated the result of these different heritages—identity—into thecurrency of power.

The def inition of an Isthmo-Colombian Area in terms of related human populationhas a certain resonance for the indigenous people themselves. Kinship is a dominant concernin Kogi worldview, as evidenced by the fact that greetings are phrased in kinship terms. Kogiworldview divides human beings clearly into kággaba (people) and non-Kogis. Within thekággaba, there are kinsmen (gaha, family) and nonkinsmen (axautshi, different), of whomthey may only marry the latter. Other indigenous people are identif ied as axautshi kággaba.The Kogi are particularly preoccupied with race (saná) and have a fundamentally racialworldview in which their superiority is presumed. They believe that they were created before

29 The cacique Ucaraci, from Coto (or Coctu), is said to have been a talented goldsmith (FernándezB. 1881–1907). Don Diego de Sojo, captain of the guard of the governor of Veragua, traveled throughVeraguas province in Panama in 1587, and noted that a cacique of the town of Ucani worked the goldhimself (MacCurdy 1911; Helms 1979).


all other peoples, and therefore view themselves as “older brothers” (duwékue), while everyoneelse is “younger siblings” (nanikue) (Gawthorne 1985). While traditional Kogi experience ledto specif ic terms for their Chibchan neighbors, the Ika and Damana, kággaba might be theappropriate term for their larger Chibchan kinship group. Today, there are about 250,000people who belong to ethnic groups of Chibchan ancestry. More than half of these are theNgöbe/Guaymí of Costa Rica and Panama, who number about 150,000. The second largestgroup is the Kuna of Panama and Colombia, numbering about 72,000, followed by theBribri and Ika, with about 6,000 people each. The remaining populations range from 50 to3,000 people.

The operative concept of an Isthmo-Colombian Area has proven useful for recogniz-ing the relationships between kinship, language, and worldview as expressed in symbolicmaterial culture among peoples with a common historical heritage. The people of the regiondeserve an aff irmative model of their past, rather than one based upon the absence of traits,as is implied by the Intermediate Area concept. Linguistics and genetics provide useful toolsfor def ining the identities of specif ic populations. There is also a growing interest amongindigenous peoples in tapping the contributions of academic scholarship to the reconstruc-tions of the history of their ancestors. The Bolivian archaeologist C. Mamani Condori writes,

A phrase which vividly expresses this is qhiparu nayaru uñta sartañani. Literally itmeans, “let us go backwards looking in front of our eyes,” but translated meaning-fully it is “let us go into the future looking into the past.”. . . To look into the past,to know our history, to know how our people have lived and struggled throughoutthe centuries, is an indispensable condition in order to know how to orient futureaction. (Mamani Condori 1996)

Only in approaching the reality of the past experiences of the inhabitants of this part of theNew World can one develop an effective vision that combines the past with the present as acontribution to the knowledge necessary for improving the quality of life of their societies.

Gold artifacts reveal elements of worldviews and structures of thought whose under-standing is critical to the reconstruction of past and present identities. Just as gold communi-cated the ancient heritage of shamans in the past, it can help in reconstituting empoweringidentities in the present. The concepts of endogenous change and diffuse unity contribute tothe active articulation of such an identity, rooted in commonalities of language, kinship, andcosmology that merit far more attention than they have heretofore received.


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